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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25764547">Lady Petra Drives Forth</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eigon/pseuds/Eigon'>Eigon</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L. Sayers</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 05:41:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,522</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25764547</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eigon/pseuds/Eigon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A very nice person asked for more about Lady Petra Wimsey, so I thought I'd take my cue from that part of Whose Body?  where Lord Peter drives Mrs Thipps to Duke's Denver "in a friend's car".</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Lady Petra Drives Forth</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lady Petra Wimsey arrived at 59 Queen Caroline Mansions in the company of Bunter and Inspector Parker.  Inspector Suggs was guarding the portals with one of his minions, and refused to allow her in.<br/>
</p><p>
He did not find it so easy to forbid entry to Inspector Parker, who volunteered to find out what was happening with respect to Mrs Thipps.  That aged lady had wrestled triumphantly with the telephone (which she had never used before) and had imparted to Lady Petra that her son had been arrested.  Since her servant Gladys had already been taken into custody by the odious Suggs, the deaf old lady had been left alone in the flat.<br/>
</p><p>
It soon became apparent that Mrs Thipps had no friends or relatives in London who could assist her.<br/>
</p><p>
"Look here, we can't have this," Petra said, as Charles Parker reported the situation to her.  "The best thing I can think of is to whisk the old lady away and take her to stay with Mother for the time being, until we can prove to the Suggs's satisfaction that poor Mr Thipps can't possibly have had anything to do with the murder of our mystery body."<br/>
</p><p>
Using all the authority vested in him, Inspector Parker managed to get Lady Petra and Bunter into the building.  There Lady Petra managed to make it understood to Mrs Thipps what the plan was, while Bunter helped the old lady pack a portmanteau.<br/>
</p><p>
"Now what?" Parker asked.  "You won't find a train to Downham Market at this time of night.  That is the nearest station to Duke's Denver, isn't it?"<br/>
</p><p>
"For the moment, all we need is a taxi," Petra said triumphantly, in the manner of a magician pulling a rabbit from a hat.  "I have a friend with a motor car."</p><p>~</p><p>Nettie Howlett opened the front door of her quiet suburban home to find a strange assortment of people standing on her front door step, foremost amongst whom was her old friend from university days, Petra Wimsey.<br/>
</p><p>
Petra had the decency to look slightly apologetic.  "I say, I'm sorry to trouble you at such a late hour but would you mind most awfully if I borrowed your car?"<br/>
</p><p>
"My car?"  Nettie asked, blankly.  "What?  Now?"<br/>
</p><p>
"I'm afraid so, old thing – it's something of an emergency.  You see I'm taking this lady to stay with Mother, and it's absolutely imperative that we go right away."<br/>
</p><p>
Nettie looked at the old lady, who was holding onto the handles of an antique portmanteau with both hands as if it was all she was sure of in an uncertain world.<br/>
"Of course I don't mind, Petra," Nettie said, "but why right this minute?  Couldn't you go in the morning?"<br/>
</p><p>
"I really couldn't leave her," Petra said.  "You see, her son's just been arrested – you've read about the body in the bath case in the newspapers, of course?  Well, it was his bath – and Suggs (that's the inspector in the case) has already arrested the servant girl, so she's all alone in the flat apart from the bloodhounds of the law, who are on entirely the wrong track, because poor Thipps obviously had nothing to do with it, apart from being the owner of the bath, so I thought the best thing I could do was trundle the old lady down to Mother out of the way."<br/>
</p><p>
As Petra paused for breath, Nettie took charge of the party and ushered them towards the adjacent garage.  The ancient portmanteau was quickly stowed away in the back of the car, and Mrs Thipps installed in the passenger seat.<br/>
</p><p>
Petra swung into the driving seat.  "Thanks most awfully," she said.  "I'll bring the motor back as soon as I can – tomorrow morning, probably," and they were off, leaving Nettie, Inspector Parker and Bunter standing by the roadside.</p><p>~</p><p>Petra had been reacting on instinct all evening – getting Mrs Thipps to Mother at Duke's Denver was obviously the right thing to do, and the only way to do it was to drive there.<br/>
</p><p>
On the way out of London, she had to stop the car at a set of traffic lights, and it occurred to her that there hadn't been any traffic lights when she was driving field ambulances behind the lines at the Front.  She had a sudden, hellish vision of the muddy track in the driving rain, and the exploding shell....<br/>
</p><p>
"Now stop it, Petra," she said to herself firmly.  "That won't do at all."  She had a job to do now, and she wasn't about to let bad memories get in the way.  Her stomach was churning, and she was sure she had turned quite pale, but Mrs Thipps didn't seem to notice.<br/>
</p><p>
The lights changed.  Petra changed gear with only the slightest hesitation, and continued on her way to Duke's Denver, speaking to herself firmly every time her mind returned to those awful memories.<br/>
</p><p>
The roads gradually emptied as they left the environs of  London, and with an open road in front of her Petra began to put her foot down.   She had always enjoyed driving at speed.<br/>
</p><p>
Small talk with Mrs Thipps was just about impossible between the sound of the engine and her deafness, but the old lady was looking around and taking an interest in what countryside was visible in the headlights and by the light of a rather feeble moon.  Petra gathered that it was some time since she had last left London.<br/>
Just outside Ely a fox ran across the road in front of them, and away into the hedge, which made Mrs Thipps exclaim in delighted surprise.<br/>
It was 2am when they finally drew up on the gravel outside the Dower House at Duke's Denver and Petra hauled at the bell to rouse the household.</p><p>~</p><p>Mrs Thipps was easily disposed of.  The housekeeper, in dressing gown and slippers, took charge of her and conducted her to a spare bedroom.<br/>
The Dowager Duchess, Petra thought fondly, looked immaculate even though she too had been roused from her bed, and listened intelligently as Petra explained how Mr Thipps had been arrested.  A plate of cold beef and cheese appeared at her elbow as she talked.  By the time she was ready to toddle off to bed, she found she had eaten all of it without really noticing.</p><p>~</p><p>She spent an uneasy night.  Her dreams were full of driving - at night, through pouring rain, along muddy tracks that snaked between shell craters.  A set of traffic lights blinked at her, red – amber – green, as a gun crew with a team of mules passed by.<br/>
A fox sat down on a muddy bank and looked solemnly at her as she raced by.  She was going faster than she had ever gone before, and the fox was sitting beside her in the passenger seat, looking down its nose at her....<br/>
</p><p>
She woke to the sounds of the maid pulling the curtains to let in a grey early morning light, and the presence of a breakfast tray on the side table near the bed.<br/>
She was somewhat surprised, and gratified, to find that she had not woken up from the nightmare in a cold sweat.  It had been a strange and disturbing dream, but it hardly compared to the  horrors in the dreams she had just after her accident.  She had re-lived the incident in excruciating detail over and over again when she first came home to recuperate, from the moment the shell exploded until she had been pulled out of the wrecked cab of the field ambulance, after which there had just been the blurred recollection of the comforting presence of Myrtle Bunter.<br/>
</p><p>
Back then, she had never wanted to get behind the steering wheel of a motor car again.<br/>
It hadn't been as bad as she had thought it would be.<br/>
The thought of doing it again, to get back to Town, did not terrify her.</p><p>*****</p><p>The morning was bright, if a little overcast, and the East Anglian scenery stretched out on every side in a series of idyllic autumnal prospects.  There was little traffic to begin with, so Petra could go as fast as she wished on the long straight stretches of road.  After a while, she began to declaim poetry, snatches of John Clare and Wordsworth and Keats.<br/>
She stopped at a village petrol pump – it could hardly be dignified by the title of petrol station – to fill up the tank, somewhere in the Home Counties.  From there the roads grew more busy, until she was again waiting at traffic lights on the outskirts of London.<br/>
</p><p>
There was the memory of the road at the Front again, but this time she could look at it objectively, and put it to one side.  It did not diminish the pleasure she felt from the morning's drive.<br/>
</p><p>
She was under no illusions that one long drive had cured her of the panic attacks, but it seemed that she was able to control her feelings, and it was possible for her to drive for pleasure.<br/>
</p><p>
She began to think that it was time she bought a car of her own.</p>
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